What Goes Up Ellie's Not Dead
by edhoogh
Summary: I wanted to write about what it would be like if Carl suddenly discovers that his late wife is actually not dead. I hope you enjoy it!


Carl pulls Russell along, Muntz following behind like something out of a bad dream. Russell knew that this was a very bad man, but he was practicing minding his manners and respecting his elders.

"Oh, you really must stay. I insist! We have so much more to talk about!" bellows Muntz.

Out of nowhere there was a distant haunted wail. Everyone stops.

"Kevin?" Russell cries out running to the crooked window at the far end of the room.

The dirty scowl that Muntz had been wearing all night relaxed. Muntz walks to the window and looks out into the jungle. Atop his very own roof he sees the bird.

"It's here" he exclaims. He pivots back to Carl and Russell but they're gone. "Get them!" He immediately demands.

Carl and Russell race down the hall swinging open every unlocked door in search of an egress. The first, a room that contained a stuffed arsinoitherium, one of Muntz's prized catches. The second, filled with tools and gizmos that were absolutely unspeakable.

By the time they reached the sixth door it seemed as though they would never get out of this twisted house of horrors. Even H. H. Holmes would be impressed by the maze that existed within these walls. The barking was getting closer. The dogs would be gnawing off their ankles any minute now. Carl reached for the handle and turned the knob as he saw them rounding the corner of the endless hallway.

An instant later Carl and Russell were on the the other side of the door. They secured it with the sliding gold lock just low enough for Russell's pudgy hands to reach. They find a light switch. The single florescent bulb in the middle of the ceiling illuminates a bed with four posts adorned with a floral duvet. This could not be the bedroom of the man they had just had dinner with.

The dogs scraped violently at the door and muttered obscenities with their bark-translator devices. There had to be a way out, or at least a way to temporarily fight off the dogs. Russell opens a creaky door adjacent to the bed. Unfortunately it is not an exit, it is a closet. As Carl rummages through the drawers, Russell begins to back away from the door, dogs still yelping in the background.

A woman emerges from behind a bright yellow rain jacket suspended from an old wire hanger. Her blue eyes peered down at Russell with affection and as she inched her glasses up the bridge of her nose, a small piece of her gray hair fell out of her elegant bun and onto her cheek. She had a subtle green button down shirt and a royal purple scarf hanging from her neck.

"Are you alright ma'am? Do the dogs scare you too?" Russell stutters as his boy scout training kicks in.

"It is quite alright young man. I have learned that their bark is worse than their bite" That voice. Carl feels dizzy as he turns around to see where it originates.

"Ellie" He manages to utter.

He hadn't been able to speak that name for a very long time. But before he could get another word in, he was interrupted by a newly created hole in the door. A moment later Muntz was in the room with a harpoon. And like every other evil mastermind, paces the room confessing his previous crime and reveals his plans before he finishes off his victims.

"It was innocent at first." Muntz reasoned. "I would write to Ellie about my search for the bird. Then I realized she could be a wonderful asset. Her doctor wasn't interested in bribes, but Ellies bedside nurse agreed to slip her rohypnol and forge a death certificate, for a steep price of course. I swept Ellie away like in the movies. El didn't like her new home at first. She never stopped fighting to return to you Carl. But eventually she realized her place here." He whispered as he brushed her cheek with the back of his fingers.

"She knows so much about this island. More than I ever could have hoped. We nearly got the bird last month with Katherine's help…"

A girl emerges from the closet and the bantering stops.

"Who are you? Are you Katherine? Were you captured too!?" Russell inquires.

She wore a blue dress; its hem laying an inch above her kneecap. She was young, no older than nineteen. Her long blonde hair framed her angular face. Her brown eyes flickered around the room and stopped at Russell.

"My name is Katherine, but I like to be called Kate. What's your name?" she asked looking up begging Muntz to allow her to humor the boy.

"My name is Russell and I am a Wilderness Explorer!" he exclaimed as he reached out to shake the young woman's hand.

"That's enough!" Muntz bellowed as he stepped in front of the girl.

He turned his back to her to address Carl and Russell. He was sure they wouldn't get away from him this time. He ordered Ellie to tie them up with a rope that he lobbed at her from across the room. But before she could get the chance to even contemplate such betrayal, Kate, standing behind Muntz all this time sank her teeth into his bicep. Muntz let out a wail like a wounded puppy. In the chaos of his pain and confusion, Kate grabbed Russell and headed for the door closely followed by Carl and Ellie. But they were stopped at the door by Muntz's pack of dogs. They had witnessed the entire encounter and were believed to be a threat to the group. They stood in silence for a moment and then a familiar voice opened the floodgates. The dogs all moved to the side to reveal Dog, sitting in the hallway.

"I said to leave master and his people alone" Dog ordered. "They are family to me, therefore they are family to you."

The other canines whimpered as Dog spoke to them. He had received a new translation device that made him sound a lot more assertive than his previous eleven-year-old boy voice. As he led Russell, Kate, Ellie and Carl out of the room, he ordered the door to be locked with Muntz inside. He would attend to him later.

Dog didn't seem quite sure how to get out of the house either, but sooner or later they once again met the light of day. He had been planning a rebellion with Alpha for weeks now. And what they had been planning for what seemed like so long, unraveled in a matter of hours when Carl and Russell arrived on the island.

Kevin was outside waiting to meet them. Russell proceeded to jump on her back. She motioned the group to a distant rock, and so they followed.

"Kate had worked for Muntz for five years now, relentlessly tracking the bird for Muntz's twisted game. I don't know how he found her, she has never told me. But she is good at what she does, she almost caught Kevin a dozen times. Muntz wasn't all that bad. He always took great care of her. Gave her everything and anything that she wanted, except allowing her to go back home to New York to be with her family." Ellie explained. She didn't have to explain what had happened to her or what had led Ellie to this place here and now. All that was important was right beside her in that moment. Carl was there and she was no longer "dead" In fact she was very much alive and ready to be with him again. Till death do they part... again.

"I just want to go home, I hope my family missed me as much as I miss them" Kate wondered out loud

"I am sure they do, Dear" Carl added as he grabbed Ellie's hand.

As they reached the rock in question, they heard faint screeching from behind it. They discovered a dozen baby birds of Kevin's kind.

Little did they know, Muntz was not so securely locked away in the same room he kept Ellie and Kate. He had a hatch beneath the floorboards that led to a tunnel that let out of the cellar doors. He cracked the left door open to be sure that there were no dogs watching, and then he followed Carl, Ellie, Russell, Kate, Dog and Kevin. The bird. The object of his decade-long obsession. This time once and for all he would prove to everyone that he wasn't crazy. This time he would have proof that this majestic bird truly does exist and they, those reporters and poachers were just trying to discredit him and his work.


End file.
